Monday, August 22, 2016

My medal count: EU, 325-USA, 121

If the European Union had competed with a single team in the Rio Olympic Games it would have obtained a total of 325 medals, including gold, silver and bronze. That would make team Europe the leader of the medal count. The second would be the United States with 121 medals, far behind. This is obtained from adding the total number of medals of each EU country in the games that finished yesterday. That includes Great Britain, which is still today a member of the EU, because despite the (very narrow) result of the Brexit referendum, the United Kingdom is still a member of the Union, since their leaders are reluctant to invoke article 50 to start real exit negotiations. If we (incorrectly) substract the British medals, the EU would have 258 medals, still 137 more medals than the US. It is European fragmentation that creates the sensation of US absolute global dominance. In fact, Europe is richer and stronger, except that lack of cohesion and nationalism prevents us from showing a more united and stronger front. Moreover, if the EU had a common sports policy, European team sports would be much better, assembling really competitive teams in basketball (combining the best Spanish, Croatian, Greek, French and Italian players), in soccer (combining the best German, Spanish, Italian and other players) and in other sports. Of course, having a EU team would reduce the number of countries in the Olympic games. This would be a good thing: the opening and closing ceremonies would take shorter and be less boring, and the scale of the games would be reduced, diminishing the power of the sports governing bodies and their incentives for corruption. Narrow-minded nationalist comments by local broadcasters would be kept to a minimum, and economies of scale would reduce the amount of waste that goes into professional sports subsidies in European countries. Additionally, some US swimmers would feel less arrogant and consequenlty would tell less lies.